Solicitors

To ask the Attorney-General what action the Government are proposing to ensure that the Law Society implements the recommendations made in the 13th annual report of the lay observer 1987 that solicitors should account to their clients for interest on moneys held on behalf of their clients.

The 13th report of the lay observer was published and laid before Parliament on 28 July 1988. Since then the Law Society has made new deposit interest rules. The rules set out a specific timetable for the minimum time certain sums of money may be held before payment of interest need be made. The rules also include an obligation on a solicitor to account for any sum of money exceeding £10,000 held for less than one week, if it is fair and reasonable in all the circumstances that such interest should be paid. The rules do not extend to solicitors acting as stakeholders, or to money held by solicitors as trustees, since the relevant primary legislation does not permit this.